and all i can do is sit and let the air speak for you
by sharoncarters
Summary: Five times Steve and Sharon talk about Steve's mother.


hello all. no, i'm not dead. surprise! i've been in such a slump lately, so if this sucks i guess that's why. it took me like 3 months to write this lmao i don't even know. so here have 5k words about steve and sharon being the cutest most angsty couple in the world

* * *

Well I'd go house to house and knock on every door,  
I'd take down all the walls and tear up every floor,  
Just to figure out, oh what we're fighting for  
\- Parachute, Words Meet Heartbeats

* * *

5.

There is once, before. Before Pierce, before Rumlow, before the Trisk. Before there was _Steve_ , and not just a mission, something that Fury had tasked her to do and she complied without question.

She's Sharon-as-Kate, not Sharon, and he's just a mark. They're in the lobby of their apartment building, the late hour making it seem a liminal space, somewhere between reality and a dream, and Sharon might just be a little bit high off of nothing but his presence. It's the first time that she realizes how dangerous it is, this mission, trying to be his friend without catching feelings, as if that was even a possibility.

The lights are low and there's no one else there but her and Steve, and Sharon thinks how foolish she has been. How desperate she is to know him. Fury had told her that she had some sort of special insight into Steve, something that she gained from Aunt Peggy and her stories, but Sharon knows that this isn't true. She sees him on his motorcycle and she doesn't know him at all, just like he doesn't know her, because all that they have of each other is stories.

What she wants, what she really needs, is something real from him. And she can't give him anything real back, but she wants to, and that makes her shiver in her thin, fake nurse's uniform, her eyes hazing over when she sees his eyes trace the the span of her face, linger on the blood stains on her left leg. (That's real, a side effect from the Hydra goon she'd taken down an hour before who was trying to steal his way into the building. In this sense, Sharon's grateful for the cover that her fake job description provides her. It keeps people from asking questions, from looking at her and seeing what she really is.)

Steve quirks an eyebrow at her as they stand there, for no other reason but not wanting the night to end, just so that they have an excuse to talk without making a big deal of it. It's almost like he understands that there's something in Sharon that would force her to rebuke him if he ever asked her out, but that doesn't stop her from wanting him to anyway. It doesn't stop her from not climbing up the stairs and leaving him there to twiddle his thumbs.

"Rough day at work?" he asks her, and Sharon fights back a smile, because really, he has no idea. There's most likely a bruise forming somewhere on her ribcage, and in a few hours it'll be harder to breathe than before, but Sharon laughs anyway, indulges this whim while she's still standing here with him. She doesn't want to be a spy right now. She wants to be a girl flirting with her cute neighbor.

"Nosebleed," she says with a grimace, shrugging. "You'd be surprised how fast the blood gets everywhere." Steve smiles again and the feeling of in between-ness lingers. In between truth and lies, in between Sharon and something else, in between wanting to ask him to come upstairs with her and running as far away from his as possible. Sharon wonders if he feels it, this war inside her, one that's been stirring almost as long as he's been back in the world.

"My mother was a nurse," he blurts out, almost shocked that he's even said it. Sharon raises her eyebrows. What she doesn't say is, _I know. That's why they gave me this cover._

What she does say is, "Small world." A pause. Sharon knows what to ask, what _Kate_ would ask, but she doesn't want to do it. She knows how awful it'll be to force him to say it. Still, she has to. "Is she still?"

Steve swallows, his lips downturning, and shakes his head. It's a stiff, jerky movement, and she can tell that it hurts him to move at all when answering. "No. She passed away."

"Oh," Sharon says. "I'm sorry." She rubs her arms, not cold but shivering anyway. She couldn't make the goosebumps go away even if she wanted to.

Steve nods. He fidgets with the hem of his t-shirt, his stupid, tight fitting t-shirt, and looks towards the stairs. It's like a bucket of water has been poured over Sharon's head, the sudden and intense shock of feeling the moment dissipating.

"I should get going," he says. "Long day tomorrow. You too, I guess, right?" Sharon nods, ponytail bobbing. She needs to take a shower, wash this day off of her. It's the first time that she's gotten too close to this, too close to _him_ , and she wants to make sure that it never happens again. "Walk you to your door?" he asks.

Sharon gives him a weak, tired smile. _Don't say it_ , her brain tells her. _Don't let him get too close_. "I'd really like that."

* * *

4.

Sharon's not really sure if they're dating, per se. It's… _odd_ is the only word that comes to mind. Because she's not worried, and she's not really anxious either. It's like she's anticipating something, but she's not exactly sure what. All that she understands is the way that her heart speeds up when she thinks about him, and that has to count. It's the only real thing she has to hold on to, now that Aunt Peggy's gone.

There's a knock on her door in the middle of the night—and, yes, she kept the place. How could she not? It was all that she had left—but it doesn't really bother her, because Sharon hasn't been able to sleep for weeks.

She doesn't bother looking through the peephole, which, in retrospect, is kind of stupid. Not like it matters anymore, though. Sharon's always geared for a fight these days, even three cups of coffee deep into insomnia and running on less than two hours of sleep.

"Hey," Steve says when she swings the door open, and Sharon's entire body is on edge, her heart slamming against her chest. She'd thought that he was in Europe, somewhere, maybe. Or even in Wakanda, if the king had taken him in. "Don't say anything," he says, and her heart cracks in two.

She's never heard him like this, with this pleading voice, begging her to do something but she's not even sure what. Why would she say anything? Who does she have to tell? Natasha's… _some_ where, Sharon's sure of that, but she's not sure where. Tony's locked himself up in the tower, like a weird iron-Rapunzel, refusing to answer her calls but occasionally sending her a meme or two, just to ensure her that he's okay.

Sharon's eyebrows knit together but she stays silent, moves to let him in. She makes an effort, she really does, but she has no idea what to say. The only thing coming into her head at the moment is "take me", which, just, no. She can't say that, no matter _how_ good he looks. So she just… "How are—"

"I keep thinking about how I haven't told you anything about me," he blurts out, his back to her. "And you still trusted me, still helped me."

"Steve, it's not a big—"

"No, it is—"

"Could you just stop interrupting me for a second?" she finally snaps, unable to stop being herself even now, even when she sees him hurting. To her surprise (and delight) the corner of his mouth quirks up, and she shivers, the new standard side-effect of being in his presence. "I trust you," she tells him, "end of".

"I keep thinking about my mother," he says, and Sharon snorts.

"That's reassuring."

"Not like—not like that. I keep thinking how much she would like you." His mouth does the half-smile again. "Even though you're not a real nurse."

Sharon laughs, a real laugh, one from deep down in her gut. It's her first in a while. "Do you want—I don't know. Do you want some coffee?" To stay here, just for a night? Forever?

"I want… I want to stay here," he says, and her gut tightens. "And I'm just… I can't give you anything. I want to give you everything, you know?" And he laughs, a small, soft sound, but it hurts. Sharon knows. It's how she felt when she was undercover all that time. "But can I stay?"

"Yeah," Sharon says. She locks the door behind her. She knows that he'll probably be gone in the morning, that if anyone asks she'll have to say that she hasn't seen him, but she doesn't care. Because even if she has to lie about it, she'll still have this, just the memory of this, Steve's soft hands and the way that he gets embarrassed about taking off his shirt.

It's the first night that she ends up sleeping through in a long time; Steve's arm around her waist, their legs tangled together. It makes her wish for a future that she never knew that she wanted.

* * *

3.

It simmers inside of her when they fight, which is not often, and usually a result of her stubbornness, but nonetheless, it's there. It's insulting, almost, even though Sharon knows that Steve would never insult her, even if he wanted to. Frustrating, too. The fact that he wants her to open up about her past, to trust him with things like ex-boyfriends and old heartaches and years of self-doubt, when he can't do the same for her.

Kind of a double-standard, if she's being honest with herself.

It usually goes like this:

Steve asks her about her past. They're doing something innocuous, watching TV or eating dinner. Sharon squirms in her seat, wherever she is, uncomfortable and desperate to change the subject. He'll have thrown out a comment about his past, without meaning to, something like "My mom and I used to listen to the radio like this", and then he'd pause, frown, and focus on Sharon instead.

She'll distance herself from him, frustrated, and say, "Tell me about your mom," and he'll decline. Sharon will pout, most likely, and then storm off to her room, and it'll be the end of their conversation, but not the end of the curiosity simmering inside of her, burning her up, almost, the desperate need to just _know_ him.

This time, they're in the Avengers Tower training room. This time, Sharon can't let it go. She's sprawled on her back, Steve hovering over her, hands spread on either side of her head. She can't help but smile at him, because he's grinning at her, and this is normally foreplay for them, anyway. She'd been so distracted that she'd let him hook a a foot behind her legs, tackling her to the mat, and she hadn't really cared. Welcomed it, even, to feel his weight against her, illicit in this public space.

"Who taught you how to fight?" he asks, teasing, voice husky. She knows that they won't do it in the training room, aren't that far gone in their relationship to completely abandon all sense of decency, not like some people that they know (cough, _Natasha_ , cough). But it's still nice to be like this with him, to feel him pressed up against her and just be content, knowing that there's nothing else coming but liking the feeling anyway.

"Aunt Peggy," Sharon answers with her own laugh, carting a hand through his hair absently. "What about you, soldier?"

"Bucky," he says, mouth turning downwards. "After my m—" he stops himself short, shaking his head and moving his weight off of her. He offers Sharon a hand to help pull her up, and she accepts it, albeit reluctantly. She knows that he'd almost mentioned his mother, _again_ , and she knows that he knows that she knows. Steve's mouth is set in a hard line. "Do you want to run it again?"

"You're kidding, right?" Sharon asks, standing now, hands on her hips and stomach twisting into painful knots. They're not at home, now. There's nowhere for either of them to run and hide to, and she can feel the tension in the air, coagulating around them and making her head spin. She hates fighting with him, almost more than anything else. But this is just the _one_ thing, the _only_ thing that he won't talk to her about. And how can she be level-headed when he wants so badly for her to open up to him, and he can't do the same? This isn't how relationships are supposed to work. This isn't how _they're_ supposed to work. On anything else, they'd rather fight it out than keep anything secret.

Sharon has kept too many secrets in her life from the people that she loves, and she doesn't want to do so with Steve, despite the deep conditioning that tells her that she needs to. She may be a spy, but that's not who she is with Steve. With Steve she is just Sharon, and he is just Steve, and they're supposed to be better than this.

"Steve," she says quietly, taking a step towards him.

He opens his mouth to say something, running his fingers over the tape wrapped around his hands, and shakes his head again. "Sharon, I can't," he rasps, swallowing. His eyes are apologetic when he looks up at her. "After all this time, it still hurts to much to just—" his throat closes up again and he makes a pathetic sound, his eyes dropping to the floor.

"I thought you said we were stronger together," Sharon mutters, bitterness eating away at her. Everything in her body is telling her to run, confirming all of her worst fears. She hates this part of herself, this deep-seeded instinct that tells her to wrap herself up, to become so solitary that only she knows the deepest parts of herself, and no one else. The part that tells her that relationships are useless, that love doesn't exist, that sooner or later Steve is going to abandon her just like everyone else, because that's what people do, isn't it? They all leave, and this reluctance to speak on his part is just the first crack that'll lead to the eventual crumbling away of their relationship.

"God, we are, Sharon, _please_. I just need— I—"

They're standing face to face now, somehow, against all reason, and Steve tucks her into his chest, hands running through her ponytail, up and down her spine. She's stiff against him for a few seconds before acquiescing, melting into him, because there's another part of her, a tiny part, that tells her, _wait_. _He's not ready_. So she stretches up on her toes and wraps her arms around his neck, a small shudder running through his body when she does so. "I just need you to trust me, okay?" she asks, voice smaller than she'd like it to be.

"I do. I trust you so, so much. More than anyone."

Sharon closes her eyes, presses tighter against him, delighted when his hands press into the bare small of her back exposed between her leggings and her work-out top. "I know. I know you do."

* * *

2.

Sharon has one picture of herself with her parents. It's not because she hates them (or hated them, past tense, because like almost every other person that she knew, they were dead). It was because she hated herself, past tense, when she was younger. Of course she had Tony, and Uncle Howard and Uncle Gabe, Aunt Peggy and Aunt Angie, but she never had friends her own age, not really. There were a few girls here and there, but they weren't best friends. (Not like Bobbi, not like Natasha or the other amazing women at SHIELD.)

Girls Sharon's age never really understood her, and Sharon wasn't mad at them for it. Mostly she was just lonely, and she wanted to be just like her Aunt Peggy, and she knew that she never would be. Sharon isolated herself from not only her peers, but from her family, too.

Steve never asks, bless him. He's always so careful of her space, even though he's a pusher. He likes to know things, to work things out on his own, and Sharon loves that about him. She just _loves_ him, in the most simple, human way. She loves that he understands this about her, that she needs time to open up, can't spill her guts like other people can. She's learned this about him, too.

He'd always seemed like the type to open up, at least early in their relationship. He had wanted her to open up, had told her so much about his time in the war, about Bucky, about Howard. (Never about his mother, though, which Sharon had understood. But she just wanted _more_. Steve made her want more, want things that she never thought that she could have.)

Sharon is a woman of grey areas, but she didn't think that Steve was the same. She didn't think he had grey areas, before they started dating. She knows differently now, can respect his space like he respects hers.

Which is why it surprises her when she feels like telling him about it, this one picture that she has. They don't really hang out like normal couples, don't have the time to. Their sex is split between frantic nights at her apartment and hidden corners: in quinjets, bathrooms, empty closets after missions. This is the first day off that they've had in weeks, and they're spending it cleaning Sharon's apartment.

"Not the hot date you were expecting, huh?" she asks him, and he lets out an amused, "Ha!" that makes her warm all over.

"If I'm with you," he grins, "every date is a hot one."

Sharon presses her lips together, trying to conceal a laugh, still surprised that this is who she's with. That Steve is the man that she's fallen in love with. He's too good for her, she thinks, and she wishes that he wasn't, but he is. He doesn't seem to think so, which is all that really matters in the end.

Steve tugs out the box that she keeps on the top shelf before she can stop him, because he doesn't know. Sharon doesn't talk about it, would like to keep her childhood in the past. In that way she's learning to trust him, to understand that no matter how amazing he is to her, he might also have some secrets that he wants to keep. It's the first thing in there, this stupid picture that she always goes back to when she misses them.

It's not often. Sharon feels like Aunt Peggy's the one who raised her, really, and she knows that she shouldn't but it's how she feels, no matter how much she loved her parents before. She never really got old enough to appreciate everything that they did for her when they were alive.

"You look happy," he says, after flipping the picture over and examining it. It's a dumb picture, a throwaway thing that everyone has in spades. But it's Sharon's only one. It's a picture of her at her twelfth birthday party, both of her parents' arms around her. It had been a good day, just that one, one that seemed like a beacon of light in such a dark time in her life. Her only guests had been her family, Aunt Peggy and the gang, and Tony. She'd been so upset that she had no real friends, felt like no one really loved her. Tony had smeared frosting over her cheek and told her that everyone in that room loved her, and he'd taken the picture. Sharon will never get rid of it for as long as she lives.

The way that Steve holds it is so soft, his thumb brushing over the ripped edges, and Sharon feels things she hasn't felt in a long time bubbling up inside of her, threatening to spill over. She walks over to Steve, leans her back against his chest.

"It's my only one," she tells him. She can't see it, but she can almost feel his eyebrows shooting up. He has so little left of his life. It's hard for him to imagine anyone not wanting to savor every moment, to preserve as much as possible. Still, when he brushes the hand not holding the picture down her left arm, she can tell that he's trying to understand. "My parents and I never really saw eye to eye, but I guess you kind of figured that out by now." Sharon shrugs, feeling the whisper of his breath moving loose strands of her hair. "It was so… _hard_ for me, back then, and I didn't know why. All I know is that I felt like I didn't fit in anywhere, least of all my own family."

"You had Peggy, though, didn't you? And Tony?" Sharon smiles, turns around to wrap her arms around his neck.

"I did."

"Do you regret it? Not saving more memories?"

Sharon knits her eyebrows together, trying to figure out the answer. "Maybe. Sometimes. But it just makes the ones that I do have that more important, you know? I can't take back what I did when I was a kid. I miss them every day, and I feel horrible about how I was to them, but they're gone now. I have to… to trust that they know that I've grown up, even though they weren't here to see it." Steve nods, running a hand through her hair. Sharon hums, pressing herself closer to him. "Do you have any pictures left? One of your entire family?"

Steve shakes his head. "Just a few of me and my mom. I could show you them, sometime, if you want that." His voice is shaky; Sharon can feel the rumble of his chest against her own.

"Of course I want that. I want to know you. Even the sad parts." His eyes soften, and then they dart back towards her closet. His lips curve up in a teasing grin.

"What I'd like to know is why you've been hiding that dress from me for so long," he says, nodding towards a red strapless number that she'd shoved to the back of her closet after a horrible undercover op she did years ago.

Sharon tries feigning innocence. "What dress?"

"Oh, you are so not getting away with that, Carter," he murmurs, hands reaching towards her backside. Sharon squeals when he tosses her over his shoulder, carrying her back towards the closet.

* * *

1.

Sharon's never been good at being intimate. It's not that she didn't want to, because she did. She enjoyed sex at a base level, as long as she didn't think about the person she was with, as long as it was with strangers. She couldn't take the eye contact even then, the desperate need that men had to try and connect with her; she couldn't do it.

It was always fast and to the point and then she bolted, because she couldn't bear the feeling of others trying to hold her when she slept, or their meaningless, attempted soothing touches. She didn't want them or need them. Sharon had been taking care of herself for her entire life, and she didn't need anyone else to do it for her.

With Steve, though, it's different. Physically and emotionally. Sometimes she can't help but reverting to her old self, even though she doesn't want to, because these feelings that she has for him are too much, too all the time and overwhelming.

Tonight, she settles on her side after they're finished, eyes shut and breathing heavy, Steve's arm wrapped around her waist. He knows how she gets sometimes, how in her own head she can be. She's shivering but it's not cold. Steve strokes a hand down her arm.

"Sharon," he says. Just that, and it's enough to pull her back, at least halfway. "Hey," he says, when she turns around to face him, clearly repeating himself, brows furrowed. "Come back." He runs a hand through her hair, grounding her, making her feel safe. Sharon looks up to meet his eyes.

"Steve," she says, hating how desperate she sounds. "I need—" she shuts her eyes again, tight, clenching her hands into fists against his chest. "I need—"

Steve tugs her into his chest, stroking her hair. "It's okay," he says. "You're here. It's okay, Sharon, I have you." The repeating her name thing is good on his part. She's never said it out loud, but he knows that she likes it. Knows that she needs it for her own reasons, and that's enough for him.

It's such an odd thing, her need to be reassured that she's not the aunt that she once so longed to be. But she needs it, and Steve knows that she needs it. Because no matter how much she says the rumors don't effect her, on some subconscious level they do. She needs to know that he's with her, that he knows that he's with her.

Steve is always open with her, always willing to share and answer questions, but never about this one thing that she keeps drifting back to, this thing with his mom. Every time a mention of his mother unwittingly slips out of his mouth he immediately clamps shut again, no matter how much Sharon pushes. But she understands, now, why he does it, why he never says anything. Because she has her own secrets, too, and relationships have to be a give and take. She can't cut and run anymore, not like she used to.

Because this thing with Steve, Sharon is in it for good. She doesn't want anyone else. So she takes a deep breath, steels herself, and opens her eyes to look at him.

"Hey," he breathes when he realizes that she's back, that she's not hunching somewhere hidden in her mind anymore, trying to keep herself safe.

"When I was," Sharon starts, taking a shuddering breath, "when I was in high school, I really liked this boy in my class." Steve leans on an elbow, the sheets tangled around them, and Sharon tugs them up around her chest. Steve places a gentle hand on her hip, a small reminder. _I'm here. I love you._ "It was so stupid. I don't even know why I liked him. But I did. There was this dance that I really wanted him to ask me to, and I was so sure that he was going to, because I had left all these hints and I just knew, you know? Sometimes girls just know. At the same time, we started learning about World War II in history." Sharon can feel the tears coming, but she knows that she has to push through. Steve needs to know, or else there'll always be this _thing_ between them. He won't open up unless she does, so she keeps going.

"Long story short, he took me to the dance." Sharon's throat closes up as she remembers it, how excited she'd been to wear the dress that Aunt Peggy had lent her, tailored to fit her teenage frame. The shame that she had felt, when she was told how awful she looked. When she was told that she didn't look like her Aunt Peggy at all, that she surely must be adopted, because no flat-chested idiot could ever be related to _the_ Peggy Carter.

Sharon had admired her aunt so much, god, she had, and that was the day that she'd learned that she was never going to be good enough. "Aunt Peggy lent me her dress to wear, you probably know the one. The red one." Steve doesn't make any movements, just looks at her with concern, stroking her hair, and Sharon keeps going. "He ripped it, spilled punch on it, got all of his friends to come along; girls, too. They just stood there and made fun of me, making me feel like absolute _shit._ They didn't hurt me, you know, but they didn't have to. It was enough." Tears are streaming down her face now, loose and hot and wet on her face. "And they told me that I'd never be as pretty as Aunt Peggy, never as good as her, and it killed me. I ran all the way home and I didn't talk to Peggy for weeks, Steve. _Weeks_. It was the longest I had gone without seeing her since I was born."

Steve is quiet as he wipes the tears off of her face. Sharon can't bear to look at him, too scared to look up and see him realize his mistake, realize that no, he doesn't want the cheap knock-off Carter, he wants the real thing.

"Sharon," he says, tucking a hand under her chin. "Hey, come on. Look at me." She does, but with reluctance. "I. Love. You." He says the words slowly, lingering on each one. "You, and no one else. I thought… when I was younger, I thought that I loved Peggy, but I… we never got that chance. And there's no use thinking about the past. I could have loved her, I cared about her, but it doesn't matter. She moved on, and so have I, okay? She lived her life and I'm living mine. There's no one else that I want. Could ever want."

Sharon abandons clutching the stupid bed sheet and crawls into his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck. "I have to say this," he says, when she leans in to kiss him. "Don't distract me," he teases.

She bites her bottom lip, smiling.

"I miss—" Steve inhales sharply, and Sharon's smile quickly drops away. She didn't think when she'd told him that story that he would open up to her so quickly. She did it because she loves him, because she wanted him to know. "I miss my mother so much," he says. "I never got to properly mourn her, you know? It was just so quick and then the war happened, and with the plane I couldn't— I didn't know how to deal with it, when I got back. I still haven't been able to force myself to visit her grave yet, and I'm sick with it, the fact that I could do that to her. I don't know how to deal with the grief. And Bucky, _god_ , back when, he offered to help me, he did. I try to be a good leader, to stick up for the team, but I don't even know how to deal with it myself. How can I tell them to keep going when I don't even know if I can do it myself?"

Sharon stokes a hand over his face and he nudges his cheek into her hand, her thumb stroking over it. She knows how he feels because she's lived it, is forced to live with it every day of her life. All of the friends that she's lost, all of her family. "You and me," she says softly, "we've seen so much death that I think… I think just pushing through it is the only thing we _can_ do. And I know that it's messy, and it hurts—" she chokes out a pathetic sounding laugh, "it fucking hurts, but we just have to. But at least we don't have to hurt alone."

"I love you," Steve says again, brushing his nose against hers as she leans into him again.

"I love you," she answers him, "I love you for telling me. I didn't mean to push, you know? I want you to want to tell me things." His arms tug at the sheet, needing skin on skin contact, needing to know that she's real, that he hasn't just imagined her.

"I want the same from you. I'm glad that you told me, too. I hate fighting with you," he murmurs, breath warm on her skin, and Sharon all but literally melts into him.

"You and me both, mister."

* * *

sorry to the anon who requested this literally like a year ago i'm garb what can i say


End file.
